No Man Left Behind: A Veteran Inspired Charity Anthology by Elizabeth Knox (black authors fiction TXT) 📕

had just under fifty square miles of territory. We gave back to the community, having charity poker runs and volunteering our time where we could. We weren’t choirboys, but we also refused to live by the laws society deemed right. If someone or something needed to be handled and the law couldn’t or wouldn’t provide, we handled it our own way.

Skid’s eyes closed and I nudged him with my foot. He looked around and stood, stretching before he pulled his shirt and cut back on. Black hair slicked away from his face, he was starting to grow a beard, hoping to move past the teenage look he still was cursed with. He only got his club name because he loved to drift his bike around, skidding the pavement, and generally being loud.

“Let’s grab something to eat before it’s all gone,” I encouraged, and he followed me to the picnic table set up under a large pavilion.

The music was blaring from speakers set up near the roll-up door to the garage, and the smell of weed filled the air. We both made a plate and sat down, digging into the tender ribs and grilled corn. Tammy, one of the older sluts, wagged her ass as she walked up, sitting her ass on the table across from us.

“You boys want some company?” she purred in a nasally tone, squeezing her naked, fake tits, trying to be seductive.

“Pass,” I replied and watched as Skid shivered in disgust.

No one touched Tammy anymore since she had been rode hard and put away wet too many times to count. She continued to hang around the club, hoping to catch a member and become an old lady. No one wants their old lady to be the doorknob of the club, so she keeps getting passed over and passed around.

She grabbed her fake tits and squeezed them together in her hands, trying to be seductive as she turned to Skid and asked, “What about you, baby? You want to have a good time?”

“Hell no!” was his reply, and she huffed before jumping down and stomping away.

Her ass jiggled in the wrong way in her tiny cut-off shorts, and I laughed as she disappeared into the crowd of leather vests.

“That was mean.” I continued laughing, and he joined in, clinking his beer bottle to mine. “You could have at least gotten some head from her.”

“Fuck no! She deserved it. Since I showed up here, that crazy bitch has been asking to ride my cock. I’d rather fuck my hand than let my dick anywhere near her nasty ass. Do you know one time I watched her fuck three brothers from Florida, and she went ass to mouth.”

I spewed my beer and nearly fell onto the floor from the look of repulsion on his face. A few brothers joined us and had the prospects bring fresh beers to the table. Kicking back and stretching my leg, I enjoyed the freedom the membership and brotherhood now afforded me.

Chapter Three

Sadie

Uncle Mick called me early in the morning to let me know Dalton, I’m sorry, Skid, was being patched into the club tonight and I was so happy for him. My younger brother wanted to be a DeathHound since he was old enough to walk, always imitating Uncle Mick and popping wheelies on his little bike. It wasn’t the future I wanted for him until I saw how happy being a hang-around made him.

Our uncle was a retired member of the club who left when he couldn’t ride anymore. I watched my uncle go from alive and happy to spiritless and depressed when his arthritis became too much to continue riding, and I worried a future for my brother might be the same. They didn’t ask him to hang up his cut, but his pride kept him from the runs and club events. I hoped with my brother joining, my uncle would at least spend some time with the brothers. I know they all miss him but respected his wishes.

Mick wanted me to know in case Dalton didn’t come home that he was safe, reminding me to keep my younger brother, Jacob, at home. We lived in a small two-bedroom house a few miles from the clubhouse. I’d been working on my business degree at the local community college and working full-time waiting tables to make ends meet. The house wasn’t fancy, but the area was safe enough for us, and with the club protecting us, I never worried. Anything was better than the hellhole I grew up in.

Our mom died almost two years ago from a drug overdose, but it had been years since she was a part of our lives, and since I was twenty-two and living on my own since I was sixteen, they granted me custody of Jacob. Dalton was within a few days of his eighteenth birthday when the stupid bitch took an overdose of heroin and never woke up. He went to Uncle Mick and gained his prospect patch the same day. Occasionally he stayed overnight with Jacob and me, but most of the time, he lived in his small cottage behind the clubhouse. Each brother had a place to crash and many of them lived there full time.

I spent many nights in Uncle Mick’s cabin with my brothers tucked into the bed beside me when my mother was too fucked up to take care of them. I was four years older than Dalton and fifteen years older than Jacob, but I was still a kid too. She neglected us all, and her brother tried to pick up the pieces where he could. None of us knew who our fathers were, and I hated her for that.

Life around the clubhouse was crazy on a good day and insane on others, but in all the chaos, they were a brotherhood that protected their own. Spending time there I saw respect, loyalty, and deep down inside, I craved the affection the brothers showed their old